The Serpent and The Sword
by mikitta
Summary: He stayed at Kaer Morhen for the winter after the battle with the Wild Hunt. But the Witcher, Letho of Gulet, wasn't going to lay low there forever. His original plan had been to head east over the Blue Mountains. This is his story. On hiatus till things settle down IRL.
1. The Scorpion Queen part 1

Thank you YenniferOfVengerberg for help with editing :)

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 _When I was a fighting-man, the kettle-drums they beat;_

 _The people scattered gold-dust before my horse's feet;_

 _But now I am a great king, the people hound my track_

 _With poison in my wine-cup, and daggers at my back._

 _Under the caverned pyramids great Set coils asleep;_

 _Among the shadows of the tombs his dusky people creep._

 _I speak the Word from the hidden gulfs that never knew the sun—_

 _Send me a servant for my hate, oh scaled and shining One._

 _When the world was young and men were weak, and the fiends of the night walked free,_

 _I strove with Set by fire and steel and the juice of the upas-tree;_

 _Now that I sleep in the mount's black heart, and the ages take their toll,_

 _Forget ye him who fought with the Snake to save the human soul?_

 _What do I know of cultured ways, the gilt, the craft and the lie?_

 _I, who was born in a naked land and bred in the open sky._

 _The subtle tongue, the sophist guile, they fail when the broadswords sing;_

 _Rush in and die, dogs—I was a man before I was a king._

 _ **"The Phoenix on the Sword" (1932)**_

 _ **by Robert E. Howard**_

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Gentle lute music strummed in time to the undulations of the barely clad dancers and the bodrhain kept time to an ancient, carnal rhythm. The smell of sweet spices and sex filled the interior of the brothel, washing over the man who stood before the madam arguing the price for his services. He was huge, over six feet tall, and broad, and he was covered in intriguing, numerous, horrible scars. She knew noblewomen who would pay fortunes to bed him for one night, if he was contracted to her house. He kept his head shaved, however, and that was a turn off as most of her female clientele found running their fingers through their lovers hair to be a wonderfully effective aphrodisiac. His limbs, well made and powerful, they boasted hard edged, lean muscles. One of his biceps was bigger than both of Madam Triska's stringy thighs put together. Eyeing him over appreciatively, she grieved she was too old to be on active duty any longer. She had always like her men raw and brawny and he almost sparked a little heat in her dried up loins.

"Nightwraiths," he purred in his deep, rumbling drawl that placed him from Vicovaro, far to the east, "are three hundred dakari marks apiece. No less. And you have three of them. To my reckoning, that's nine hundred marks, plus expenses. I will take care of your wraiths for fifteen hundred marks total. Take it or leave it."

"Ahh witcher, you wound me deeply! We are but gentle flowers in this establishment and the wraiths have scared away my customers so I have no money. One of the washer girls was even slain last week. How am I to afford your price! Have a little pity on an old woman and her fragile children."

Letho of Gulet snorted disdainfully and stared down at the dusky skinned procuress in a way that dried up the spark that was trying valiantly to stir up her already arid loins. His eyes were slit pupiled, like all witchers, and they reminded her of a snake. If the large man had known her thoughts he might have laughed. Until a scant year ago, he was a witcher of the viper school and a king killer. Now, he was was the last of the vipers, to his knowledge, and using an old Griffon school medallion he had found at a market stall in Caingorn. He had left the north far behind him in the early spring, after the snows left the passes around Kaer Morhen, and headed east, toward Haakland. Now he found himself stuck in the sleazy metropolis of Banzarnavar, a sprawling city on the Hyborian plains that made Novigrad look like a reedy, backwater shithole. He was sick of this city, sick of this brothel and sick of this contract before he had even taken it.

"My price is fifteen hundred dakari marks." He turned away from her, his two swords, slung over his right shoulder, shifting on his back. "Maybe you'll find someone to do it for you in exchange for a week in the hay with one of your girls, Triska."

"What about the law of surprise?" Whined the madam, trying to cajole the witcher into capitulation, "I could give you that which I don't know I have yet."

"Not like any of your girls are going to have babies, you ensure they take their tea every morning, Madam, and I have no need for a newborn pig or dog, either" He raised a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose between his thumb and index finger taking a huge gust of air into his lungs, ignoring the scent of woe and abuse that hung about the place. At least brothels west of the Blue Mountains were filled with women, and even some men, who joined the oldest profession willingly. These girls and boys had little choice. Slavery was rampant here in the hinterlands between Zerrikania to the south and the northern border kingdoms. It wasn't as if he could afford to walk away from the contract. His gold had run low with the cost of replacing his horse's tack and saddle.

"Tell ya what, Triska. Nine hundred marks and you will grant me whatever unexpected thing you have that you don't currently know that you have. It will be mine and I will ride away from here. If it's a child, I will return for it. Is that understood?" Letho's head was starting to hurt. Right behind his left eyeball. Damn. Geralt of Rivia's notorious chivalry had rubbed off him after the fight with the Wild Hunt and it was giving him a migraine.

The madam hemmed and hawed, but eventually capitulated and was set to scurry off to see if her pigs were ready to give birth yet, or if someone had brought her a goat to pay for a wench, of which she was currently unaware. Letho stopped her with a huge hand on her shoulder.

"Here's my instructions. Fail to follow them and I'm not responsible for damages or deaths to your patrons or prostitutes, got it?"

She nodded, gulping convulsively. That spark in her loins had definitely turned into a dull, lead ball that bore no moisture to the deserted wasteland south of her dangling paps.

"You will clear the entire house out. You will tell your customers to come back no sooner than three days from now. You and your prostitutes will leave the house and not come back. Three days for you too. Is that understood?"

"But where am I to take my doves and daughters, Master Witcher?"

"I really don't care. But none of you can stay here." He looked out the dingy window that struggled to let air and light into the room. It was now four hours after noon and another three hours before it got well and truly dark. "Do it now."

"What? What? Now? I've had no time to prepare!" she squealed.

"You want the wraiths gone or do you want to use them to entertain customers?" he ground out. The sharp throbbing above his left eye was causing the eyelid to twitch spasmodically, which added to the witcher's terrible countenance and prooved to be the final death stroke of Triska's doubtful passion.

The madam started screeching orders then, which did his throbbing head no good. Letho grabbed a bottle of honey mead off an abandoned table and sat down to drink it while watching the exodus, savoring the mead. The big witcher timed the completion of the bottle with the evacuation of the last of the whores. then reveled in the silence for a span of heartbeats before rising to find his horse and bring in his saddlebags.

Brewing potions was much easier to do over a brazier than an open campfire, which is what the Viper usually did when on a contract, so he enjoyed the experience while he could. He mixed up some specter oil to apply to his blade along with katakan and full moon potions to increase his resistance to damage. The witcher spent an hour sharpening and then oiling his silver blade, testing it's weight in his hands as he twirled it in deadly arcs. He ensured he had a couple of Moon Dust bombs tucked in his bandolier then he knelt on the floor, slowed his breathing and closed his eyes.

His hands lay slack on his thighs and his muscles were relaxed as he danced with each of the three wraiths in his head, visualizing each move, right down to where he would lay down his yrden trap. Each spin, each moulinette, each pirouette was considered; every weakness of the spirits was reviewed. He brought to mind everything his old masters at the Viper school had taught him about these beings that spawned out of the strong emotions that could accompany a person's death. He breathed in and out in slow, measured time, slowing his heart rate to an incredible thirty beats per minute.

The creatures were the negative energy wraiths of three sisters who had died the year before in the brothel. They had been murdered by a particularly brutal customer, one after another, and their spirits were unsettled. He wasn't sure yet why they had taken a whole year to make their appearance or if he would have to fight them for three consecutive nights or not. There had been stories of just such happenings amongst his Viper bretheren, and some said you had to battle each night for each spirit in the group because of the complex way they were bound to this plane of existence.

Ten minutes before he estimated the wraiths would make their nightly showing, he roused himself from his trance, quaffed his potions, and braced himself for their impact on his circulatory system. He often thought it was like being kicked in the balls by a rabid mule that wanted him dead. His veins stood out, a stark bluish black against his pale skin, tracing his brutal visage like evil spiderwebs. He then rose up, hefted his silver sword, checked his bombs one more time and headed up the stairs to the third floor, to the dance floor, the ballroom where he would dance with the ladies.


	2. The Scorpion Queen part 2

The big witcher moved with silent grace up the stairs to the third landing of the brothel, his silver sword held ready in his hands. He carefully placed his feet so as not to disturb the loose floorboards he had already made note of in his initial investigation, shifting his weight fully onto the balls of the forward foot before moving another step. He kept his breathing even and quiet, driving his pulse lower, remembering the old Viper combat master drilling him decades ago on the importance of deadening the human instincts toward panic within himself. His limbs were held loose, relaxed, for tight muscles slowed the reflexes. Quiet whisperings in the abandoned building echoed in his ears, the fall of dust to the floor below as he moved into position, the creaking of plaster as the exterior cooled in the advancing darkness, the scuttle of rats in the kitchen, small sounds that were not so noticeable when the musicians were playing and patrons were negotiating for sex.

The smell of human pheromones was still heavy in the air as Letho drew in a slow breath through his nose. Sex, alcohol, hashish, fisstech, perfumes of every sort and quality, soap, last evening's mutton, and the undertone of camel shit that hung heavy over the entire city all came to play on his sensitive nostrils. He was waiting for the one distinctive and signature scent of the three sisters, the night wraiths that haunted the upper story of Madam Triska's House of Comfort and Joy. What a pretentious name for a whorehouse, thought Letho. People were always trying to make themselves sound better than they were, from old hags who sold prostitutes all the way to the mighty in the kingdoms of men. It didn't matter who they were, they wanted glory.

There it was! Just a whiff of night blooming jasmine, balsam and styrax touched with honey. It was unique and unmistakable. Only the three girls who had been murdered had used that purfume. It was far too dear to be common and there was wild speculation how they had gotten it in the first place. The big man crept into the room at the end of the hall, keeping his back to the walls, his slit pupils blown wide to allow the ambient light to filter in. Had he but known it, his eyes were glowing, the membrane behind his retina reflecting every moonbeam it could to reveal plainly what was in the large chamber. His medallion, really not HIS but the one he used now since his had been delivered over a year ago to Emperor Emhyr Var Emreis, vibrated against his breastbone, jerking like a frog that had just been gigged on a pike.

The Viper crouched, prepared to cast yrden and toss the bomb with silver particles that would prevent the sisters from dematerializing after they had gone corporeal. His skin prickled as he sensed the shift in energy and a millisecond before a clawed hand reached for him, he cast the sign onto the floor in front of him. It would slow the creatures and allow his silver sword to bite and rend them, let him bestow upon them final death. Horrid shrieks filled the air and he detonated his moon dust, revealing all three wraiths in their rotted, eternally damned glory.

"Let's dance, ladies," he bellowed, his voice a scythian roar as his blade whirled and sliced in beautiful, deadly arcs. He dodged and rolled from their attacks and drew them around and around again into the circle of his yrden trap. Pirouette, lunge, spin, back stance, slice, twirl, step; faster and faster he moved until his motion was a blur of murder and carnage. Finally the first sister fell and the other two dematerialized, leaving him heaving in air, wiping sweat from his face. He sifted through the material remains of the vanquished sister, little more than a heap of silvery white ashes, and found some bits that would be useful in replenishing his potions.

He also found something strange, something he had never found in the remains of any kind of wraith he had encountered in his long, witcher life. He picked it up and went downstairs to find some food and a bed for the rest of the night. He ate and drank his fill from Triska's larder then lit an oil lamp on one of the tables with igni, sitting back in the chair to examine his find. It was a bronze dragon charm about the length of his pinky finger and it looked like it had been entwined about something, or could be. The witcher dropped the charm into his belt pouch and settled in for the night, knowing that detoxing from the potions he had taken earlier would take it's toll on his body. It was always bloody painful and he was glad he was in solitude to endure it.

Letho slept well into the morning and emerged from the building around noon to replenish his alchemical supplies. He would need to brew more potions. If he recalled the old teachings correctly, tonight's battle would be more difficult. The three wraiths were connected. The defeat of the first would strengthen the remaining two, siphoning its power into them. If he survived, the last fight would be the hardest and most murderous with the strength of all three combined in one entity.

Wandering about the city that afternoon, Letho questioned some jewelers about the charm. No one had seen it's like, nor knew of any symbolism that might be associated with it. One offered him three marks for the little dragon, but the witcher refused and moved on from the stall. He returned to the brothel, adroitly avoiding Madam Triska since he didn't want to answer her questions or give her the chance to wheedle him down on the agreed upon price of the contract.

The steps of the previous night were taken once again, the preparation of the blade, the brewing of the terrible potions, meditation, then the steady ascent of the stairs to the dance floor. It was a more strenuous fight this night, the specters striking with greater speed, and he did not dance well enough to escape new scores on his already scraped and scoured body. He found a silver dragon this time, much like the first and upon comparing the two, found they fitted together in a strange configuration that was only two thirds complete. He nestled the figurines together in his pouch, then descended to eat and drink, then sweat out the poisons from his body. As always, after a fight, he hoped for a dreamless sleep until it was time for the final dance.

All his preparations were complete and he waited in the dance hall, blue black veins spidered just under his skin as adrenaline coursed in his blood, singing through him with a raging melody. He twirled and spun his silver sword, working himself into a battle frenzy and when his medallion shuddered and shivered upon his chest, he cast his yrden and screamed his challenge to the thing that materialized before him.

The wraith lunged at him, horrible, sickly in it's manifestation of pain,rage and death. The face, if one could call it that, was a hideous skull with the lower jaw missing. A tongue, impossibly long, impossibly grotesque, licked and thrashed at the air as if scenting his presence. The eye sockets were empty holes, glaring with malevolence, burning with a black intensity in their endless depths that turned his stomach. She stank, this wraith, this nightmarish hag, of the grave, of death, of every evil nightmare and she screamed a soulless, soundless wail that wrenched at the witchers mind, driving him to his knees before he fought back against the mental onslaught.

She slashed once, again, a third time with her claws, ripping shreds in his sword arm before he could whirl behind her and strike with a downward blow followed by a piercing lung. That soulish shriek sounded again and bounced around in his head, rocking him on his feet, slowing his reaction time and making him sluggish. He managed to roll beneath the strike that would have torn his throat out. And again, as she struck behind her with wildly flailing talons, the sharpened bones of her fingers rigid in death were deadly claws extended in fatal rigor. The witcher threw another yrden trap to slow her, cast quen on himself to shield him from her strikes. She came at him like a hellcat, fast, faster than he could possibly imagine and he desperately parried every blow, every shuddering impact making his blade sing. He feinted to the left and brought his silver sword around and slashed her foetid head from her skeletal shoulders and screamed in victory as she crumpled before his blade, falling into a pile of dust at his booted feet.

He fell to his knees and shuffled through the detritus till he found what he was looking for. The third dragon lay in his shaking hand, sparkling and alive with fire thrumming through the metal. Ignoring his wounds, he pulled out the other two dragons and pieced them together in a complex puzzle. In the palm of his hand lay a tricolored scorpion made out of the three charms, he couldn't take his eyes off it as it seemed to glow from within. His griffon medallion bumped about on his chest but he ignored it, staggering to his feet, swaying from adrenaline crash and loss of blood.

The witcher realized the light emitting from the scorpion was solidifying before him and finally paid attention to his amulet. He held up his sword, knowing he was in poor shape for another round on the dance floor. Letho backed away, holding his sword point up as the figure materialized from what seemed to be pure light. He had dropped the scorpion to take up a defensive stance and the tip of his silver weapon was pointed right at the heart of the majestic woman who took form within the coalescing radiance. She was beautiful and terrible. Her hair seemed like fire, though it was as golden as a Novigrad oren and her skin glowed bronze as though kissed by the sun. She was entirely unclothed and her raw beauty scorched him deep in his wretched soul. But it was her eyes, oh her eyes, silver framed with golden lashes in that bronze face that held him arrested where he swayed. She was speaking but he did not understand the words; murmuring something rhythmic, rhyming within in his head, making it spin in time to her chant. The tip of his sword dropped, then his whole sword dropped out of his slack grip as she stepped toward him. Her hand came up and hovered about his face, tracing a scar here, a crag there. He reached up and started to undress, fighting against it, but complying with the silent command that reverberated in his mind, seeing only her terrible eyes, hearing her chants. He swayed in time with them as he pulled off his leather gambeson, his pants, his boots, his sword and scabbards, he swayed before her, magnificent and male, seeing only her terrible eyes.

The hand that fluttered about his face made a move toward the floor and he went to his knees before her. His back arched, his arms akimbo and his head thrown back exposing his throat to her, he struggled to tear away from her control. She swept away all the mess of his clothing and armor and arms with a single sweep of her delicate, terrifying hand and laid him out spread eagle on the floor.

He tried to talk, to protest, but he was drowning, she was crushing his will. He was staring at the ceiling, his hands and feet pinned by invisible force to the floor at the four cardinal directions. Could he but see himself from above, he was stretched out inside an eldritch circle of runes running lightning blue around him, singing with power, flickering and flying like captured will-o-wisps. Her hands moved down his scarred body and he could not help his reaction to her touch, she stirred his loins against his will and the laugh that rippled out of her throat chilled through him to settle a the base of his spine. The flickers of magic that danced around the runes began to dance and dart on his pinned form, then flow into her hands as she waved them just above his abdomen.

Then the pain started with a little spark low in his belly, and spread in a radiating spiral through every nerve ending. It felt like laying in the lab under the witcher keep when he was undergoing the trials of the grasses. His body arched and writhed as the pain, the torture, escalated and he began to scream and cry out, arching his back like a taut bow. Only his hands and feet and head contacted the floor as the dweomers raced through him, the lightning crackling with increasing force and magnitude until he glowed blue from it. The pain surpassed the trials he had endured as a boy, and he thought he would not survive this trial of the light and the terrible, beautiful woman. He was no longer screaming but making an unnatural, animal sound, a baying growl that echoed off the walls, his eyes rolled back in his head and his body convulsed under the onslaught of her power. Finally, Letho slumped to the floor, succumbing entirely to her will. He felt her words in his mind as his consciousness slipped away.

 _[Witcher. You are strong and you might prevail where others have failed me. You will be tested. If you pass the tests, you will be tried. If you win through the trials then your path shall be directed. I have decreed and so shall it be.]_

Her hideous hand, so slim and beautiful, plucked the griffon medallion from his chest and crushed it to powder, which she blew away on a breath. If anyone had been courageous enough to creep into the brothel that night and spy upon the unholy wails that had emanated from it's top floor, they would have seen the terrible, beautiful woman shimmer and shrink into a glowing scorpion, no longer than the the big man's pinky finger, a scorpion with curled tail that, if seen from the right angle looked like three dragons' heads interlaced. The scorpion crawled up the man's body, daintily positioned itself upon his breast bone and hooked it's stinging tail about the empty chain that looped around his neck, locking itself around the links. Then it grew very still and the glow that had been emanating from it died. Letho of Gulet slumbered, unaware of the dragons turned scorpion, or of the rising sun, and no mortal had dared to witness what had transpired.


	3. The Scorpion Queen part 3

Dust sparkled in sunbeams above his bare body, dancing along illuminated paths and settling on the witcher's still form like hoarfrost. His eyes drifted open, staring blankly to the ceiling as he attempted to capture the last tatters of the dream he had moments before waking. Letho was sprawled like a starfish on the floor. He couldn't quite remember how he ended up here, the vague and fading echos of agony whispering through his mind made him shy away from the effort.

He was aware that his sword arm hurt, then other aches and pains checked in from around his anatomy and he realized it was a convention of misery amongst every muscle he had, and a few he didn't own to most days. Carefully he sat up and looked down at his naked flesh, noting how his belly rippled with the effort. He pulled the little scorpion medallion up to look at it as memory finally washed over him and he recalled in minute detail what had occurred after he dispatched the third wraith. A quick glance out the window gave him the time according to the sun and he hauled himself to his feet, dressed and rearmed himself, then headed down the stairs to find sustenance and let the whore's back into their brothel.

His head had cleared considerably by the time he ambled into the little courtyard just outside the back door. Triska was standing near the step, trembling and glancing with nervous fright to the window at the top floor of the building. The various prostitutes were huddled in clumps guarded by big men with wooden clubs. Letho was pretty sure the guards weren't there for the protection of the whores. He squinted in the sunlight and faced the madam, his headache of three days ago taking residence once again behind his eyes.

"Alright, Triska, pay up." he rumbled in his Vicovorian drawl.

"Thank the gods and fates that you live! We heard … we heard the most awful noises early, before the sun arose. Sure you had failed and died!" said the old woman looking him over with her faded eyes.

"Yeah. I'm not dead. Your wraiths are gone. Pay up." He stood implacably before her, waiting, his gaze boring holes through her. He wanted nothing more than leave this place and get a room, a bath and a good meal. It didn't matter what order he got it in so long as it wasn't here.

The little woman snapped her fingers and one of her strong arms trotted up to her, counted out coins into a pouch and handed them over to her waiting claw. She handed the coin purse to the big man and stuck out her hand to clasp his to signify the end of their contract. He refused to take it.

"Remember, Triska, you owe me that which you have but you do not yet know you have." His eyebrows had crashed down, giving him a decidedly murderous appearance. The boney little madam swallowed past the lump in her throat. Just then, they both heard the creak of cart wheels as they turned into the yard. A prison wagon drawn by an ugly donkey was pulled up to the back of the house. Women huddled in the bed of the wagon caged by a lattice cage. A pile of filth and rags that looked as though it had been heaved into the corner lay on the bed of the wagon. The cartman snicked to the beast and pulled the reins stopping their forward progress. He jumped down from the box and strode up to Madam Triska with a wide, gap-toothed grin.

"Triska! Come see the new meat I have acquired for you this morning at market!" He obviously referred to the slave market that was held near the city's center. He waved his hand back toward the cage as two of the bully boys were pulling forth the naked women to stand before the procuress. Triska gave a triumphant glare at the big witcher and bustled up to look at her new merchandise, considering which was the least healthy to give him, grabbing one girl's chin, yanking down the hands of another trying to preserve her modesty.

Letho watched as the cart driver returned to the back of the cart and caught at something near the rags and yanked. The whole piled moved and the rags turned out to be a boy-child, maybe five years old, with filthy, dun colored hair and a defiant face that was mottled with such a multitude of bruises his skin tone could not easily be determined.

The big witcher began to feel something twist in the pit of his stomach and creep about the base of his spine as his feet were drawn forward by something that seemed more compelling than his own free will. He watched Triska's hand snake out, latching to the boy's chin and the winding, sinuous serpents of fate squeezed his bowels, freezing his innards.

"That one," Triska said mockingly, "The girl with the dull hair, there is your reward, Witcher. There is your unknown surprise." she indicated a girl who was obviously weak with illness and she cackled.

The Viper looked into the boy's face and beheld a defiant silver gaze with a rebellious toss of head. On closer inspection, the child's hair wasn't dun. His eyebrows were a stunning gold and Letho saw bronze skin peeking out on one ear. His head buzzed and he felt like he was inhaling finely crushed glass as he stuck his his face into Triska's, making her glee turn to dread.

"No. You expected the women. You knew they were coming today." he said, watching the truth crawl across the madam's face, "I will take the boy, Triska. Because you didn't expect him. That is my claim to surprise and what you owe me." His face cracked into a hideous smile as he held his hand to the woman, daring her to deny him his right. Triska nodded once with a sour look, then clasped his hand. The big witcher scooped the child up to his shoulder and, without a backward look, strode away to find his horse.

Several hours later, after they were both cleaned up the two sat at a small table in the corner of the inn's common room stuffing their bellies with a hot meal and cold ale. The child looked at the frightening man who had taken him from the skinny crone. He looked at the medallion that swung in front of Letho's breast bone and then up into his terrible, mutated eyes. He recognized the medallion, though he wouldn't have been able to say from where, except that he had seen it in a dream.

"What's your name, boy." the man grated at him and the child jumped in his seat, staring like a startled kitten with his very, very gray eyes. "I won't bite and I won't hurt you," said Letho around the chicken bone he was gnawing, "you are safe now. What is your name?"

The boy took a deep breath and said, "I dreamed of you last night. I saw your face. I saw your eyes. Why did I dream of you?" The question was asked in a whisper and Letho saw the fear dancing in the child's face. It echoed his own unease. He wasn't a man who believed in destiny's children, though he had encountered many who did. He wondered what Geralt of Rivia would have to say to that.

"Hmm." The big man grunted. "Tell me your name and who your people are. How did you end up on the slave block?"

"I don't remember." The boy looked down at the table, swirling his spoon in his freekeh and pushing it around the wooden slab that served as his plate. "I remember nothing but days and days and days and days of marching in chains." Indeed, his wrists and ankles were bruised and cut from manacles.

"Gotta call you something.'

"They called me Kohtavi in the slave train." Said the young one, finally eating his freekeh with gusto. He had gone too long without a guaranteed meal to waste the food.

Letho grated out a laugh. Kohtavi meant young dog in the local dialect. So be it. "Alright, Tavi. Eat, then you'll sleep. We'll leave tomorrow."

The boy looked up with interest. "Where will we go, sir?"

Again the big man laughed. "I don't know, and I don't care. Anywhere but here. He reached out and ruffled the child's hair and set to, devouring his own meal and drinking his ale.


	4. The Silver Rogue part 1

**"Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under 't." - (MacBeth, Act I, Scene V)**

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"What light in yonder window breaks? 'Tis the east and Juliet is the sun!" quoted the foul creature crouching in front of the bars of a cage. Surrounded by darkness with only the malodorous fetor of his rotting, undead form to keep her company, the woman in the cage huddled in on herself and tried not to retch. She was dangerously dehydrated and had nothing left to bring up. Her water skin had run dry two days ago and she hadn't had anything to eat in over a week. Not that it mattered much, really. The bard, Truvio, would soon loose what little was left of the rest of his mind to the curse that had gripped him in death and turned him into … this, this thing. When he finally slipped fully into undead madness, he would tear her apart. It really was just a matter of time. She would either die slowly of thirst and hunger, or she would die less slowly, torn asunder by a wight and the necrophages he controlled.

Trelisha moaned as Truvio started to sing some ballad or other, strumming his lute. In all this crazy time, he guarded that thing as if it pinned him to this world. For all she knew, it did. His voice was, amazingly, still silken and if not for his stench, she might even unbend enough to enjoy it.

"You can join me, fair Juliette, you can be my Aphrodite, my Melitele. You can let the blessing come over you and we'll rule this wonderland, this underland, as a queen loved by her king." A clawed hand reached into the cage to stroke her bare ankle and the girl in the cage cringed away.

"Sorry, Truvio, I think I'll pass. Could I please have more water?" She wheedled, more of a crackling hiss through her dry throat.

"The voices, they ring. The voices …. The voices they tell me a death of suffering will rise you back into a princess to live the dark light, the night and fight."

"I didn't understand you much before you became this creature, bard. I certainly don't now." She muttered, hugging her knees tight to her naked chest and pressing her face into them. She would have wept if she had water for tears.

What was that? A sound trickled down the crypt to her sensitive elven ears. She kept herself still, not betraying even by a flicker of a toe that she heard what sounded like the grind of a boot on broken tiles. Truvio began to sing again, when suddenly all bedlam broke out and the rats started squeaking in alarm.

"To arms! To arms! To me! I am your king, to arms!" The wight shrieked, slapping at the necrophages that had gathered to him. "Intruders, we must repel the invasion! Cintra, to arms! Rivia! The North, the bleeding North! Disdain! Madness!" His voice faded away as he ran from the chamber where she was trapped.

For the first time in a week, she could breath without feeling like she was in imminent danger of vomiting her bowels whole upon the floor. Trelisha didn't know how long the skirmish lasted, nor who was winning as the sounds of fighting rattled around the chamber. She tried to take advantage of the situation, however, focusing with all her waning strength in the deep blackness of the crypt. The splinter of metal that her seeking hands had grasped before Truvio had thrust her inside the cage lept to her hand and she set to work on the lock. Damn, her fingers were shaking. If she could manage to not break her lock pick, that would be great. Another sound. Was that the undead? Were the necrophages coming back? Just a little more, she could feel the lever inside the lock begin to shift.

One ….. step ….. More ….step …... Minute …... step …. Her hand spasmed and she dropped the pick.

"Damndamndamndamndamn!" She swore as light pierced the darkness, blinding her. "AAAAHHH!" she moaned, covering her face with a forearm, cringing to the back of the cage.

"Well, well, what do we have here." Purred the dark edge of a man's voice. He wasn't Truvio, thank what ever gods were listening. She could breath without gagging.

"Wa … water." She begged. Her strength was fickle and it had fled with the light.

The man grunted and thrust something through the bars at her. She lowered her arm, letting her eyes accustom themselves to the weak flicker of the torch he held. Greedily she grabbed the water skin and pulled the cork, guzzling the blessed liquid inside, moaning in bliss as her parched tissues soaked up the moisture. She drained the skin and begged again. "More, please." Her eyes met those of her savior and her silver brows rose in surprise. "Shite! I suppose your going to charge me for that, huh?" She said as the last of her desperate strength left her and she slumped to the floor of the cage, unconscious.

Letho looked down at the girl behind the bars. She was filthy, naked and on the verge of death. Looking around the crypt, the big man finally found a likely key shuffled in the dust at the base of an ossuary shelf. It fit the lock and he opened the door, pulling her out of the low prison. He wasn't quite sure what this waif was, other than tiny. She had ears like an elf, but was barely big enough to be considered human. At the same time, she was too tall to be a gnome or a halfling, and far too slim for a dwarf. The big witcher lifted her in his arms, barely noticing her slight weight, struggling not to step on her hair as he stood. The dirty mass draped over his arm and brushed the top of his thigh. He hadn't taken note of her eyes. The effects of Cat had worn off just as he had entered the crypt and he'd opted to light a torch rather than waste another potion on exploration. The flickering light hadn't been adequate to differentiate color, only that they might be light rather than dark. Hefting her over his left shoulder like a sack of grain, he made his way out of the caverns and found his horse. He would come back later and see if what he was looking for was here. He shifted the girl in his arms and set off for camp.

The big Viper had left his ward at an abandon hut tucked into a little valley by a stream. Starlight twinkled down, illuminating his way into the yard where Letho dismounted. He got Khotavi up and had him heating water as he put the girl on his own bedroll. She was definitely the worse for wear, covered in grunge, bruises and scrapes that should have been dressed over a week ago. Displaying a gentleness those who knew him would be surprised by, the giant washed the mystery lady's face, scrubbing off the dirt and dried blood to reveal beauty that took even his black heart by surprise. He finished cleaning her up, and dressed her in one of his shirts to preserve her dignity when she awoke. As he pulled the tunic over her head, he moved her hair away from the back of her neck and froze. Tattooed on the pale skin there was a scorpion in silver, bronze and gold bearing a tail that looked like the heads of three dragons. Sucking in a huge gust of air, Letho finished dressing her. He had barely tucked her into his blankets before he noticed her eyes glittering at him. Silver. Her eyes were silver.

"So I didn't imagine it." She whispered hoarsely, "You're a witcher and you saved my life. Thanks." The girl pushed up on an elbow and looked around. "Hmm. I don't suppose you found where that ploughing bard hid my gear, did you?" Her voice was strained, husky still from dehydration. Letho helped her drink, noting that she was too shaky to hold a cup steady.

"What's your name?" He asked, sidestepping her question.

"Just call me Treli." She flopped back down on the padding, too exhausted to hold herself up any longer, but she remained conscious. "What do I call you? Witcher is the obvious choice, but it's so impersonal."

Letho was a little taken aback by Treli's sass. The woman couldn't even hold herself up for a full minute and she was taking charge of the conversation. "Letho of Gulet." He murmured in his deep drawl.

The silver eyed woman chuckled, then yawned. "The King Killer himself. Imagine my luck. Did you kill Truvio when you came charging in?" Her eyes were drooping now.

"Truvio? That your bard?" Letho asked.

"Well, what's left of my bard after the curse caught him. Stupid ass. Told him to let me open the vault. But he wanted to prove he was every bit as able as I am to disarm a trap." Her eyes had drifted shut, but she wasn't asleep yet. "Killed him, then raised him into a stinking thing that still spouted poetry, killed the rest of our party, too, but they stayed dead. I managed to dodge out of the way in time to save my skin, not that it did me any good." Her voice was becoming clogged with impending sleep. "He can control necrophages, by the way. Unless you did for him already. If not, he's canny. Even undead, he's retained some of his mind."

"You're assuming I'm going back." He said, not really expecting an answer. Her breathing had started to drop into a slow, even rhythm.  
"I know you will. Bet you're after the same thing we were." And with that, she dropped off into slumber.

Standing over her sleeping form, Letho scratched the back of his neck, then fiddled with his medallion. The scorpion made of three dragons sat quietly on his breastbone as he stroked it. He checked on Tavi, who had already gone back to sleep.

The witcher rode out of the little yard, turning his horse back to the crypt and considering his strategy, glad he still had necrophage oil from the brothel job. Approaching the tomb, the witcher's sensitive hearing tuned in to the sound of a lute being strummed. His scorpion medallion began to tremble against his chest. Truvio lived.

The big man brought his horse to a halt and dismounted a hundred away from the ruins and settled down to prepare. Treli had said this thing was clever, retaining some form of human intelligence. That was unusual for most cursed or undead beings, the transformation stripping them of anything resembling human ingenuity, though some retained fractured memories. Letho prepared his blade and quaffed his potions, riding the effects as he settled his breathing into a hunting tempo.

He followed the rhythmic tones of the bard speaking as if to an audience. Creeping forward, he found the foul thing had laid aside his lute and stood under the stars, surrounded by several ghouls. One of the corpse eaters brought Truvio the rotting head of a dead man. In fascinated horror, Letho listened to the words spoken in ringing and malignant tones.

"Alas, poor Radovid! I knew him, Foltest: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is!" The wight hung his rotting face as if in grief, turning away from the gory head in his hand before looking back. Hee raised a hand to trace the gruesome thing with a finger. "My gorge rims at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?" The undead bard set aside the head and paced before a bench, delivering his soliloquy to his monstrous audience.

"No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: as thus: Henslet died, Henslet was buried, Henslet returneth into dust;" Nodding as if in agreement to an unspoken response, the wight continued. "the dust is earth; of  
earth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel? Imperious Emhyr, dead and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away:  
O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter flaw!"

The witcher didn't consider himself a refined or cultured man by any means. This bard might have been a formidable troubadour at one time, but now, the filth was just in Letho's way. One slinking, stealthy step at a time, the big man crept up to the impromptu theater, then tossed an incendiary bomb amongst the necrophages as he roared and charged into combat.

* * *

Yes, you are right. Truvio is reciting lines from ACT V:SCENE I of Hamlet!


	5. The Silver Rogue part 2

"To be, or not to be? That is the question—" Hissed the demented bard, Truvio, through hoary, misshapen lips as the last of his pet ghouls were cut down by the huge witcher. "Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and, by opposing, end them?" The vague working's of his tortured mind clung to what he had been in a past life. He existed for these words of another Bard who had trod the boards in a different world, never remembering where he had first read them. Truvio thrust every effort into delivering a memorable performance.

Letho circled the creature. It stank, but not as bad as the worst stench the witcher had ever been misfortunate enough to gag over. He divorced his mind from the heady miasma rolling off the creature and swiftly reviewed what he knew about fighting it. Physically, it most resemble some variation of wight, though he had never heard of them being amongst the living dead. There really wasn't such a thing. When the dead rose up, they were negative energy reflections of who they had been in life, like wraiths or botchlings. Wights, on the other hand, were cursed creatures and curses could be lifted. Truvio was cursed, surely. But he was also dead. The scorpion medallion laying on Letho's breast thrummed and cavorted as the strange magic reacted with it. Whether they be spirits or wraiths or they just stayed dead like they were supposed to, most of the monsters he fought didn't yammer incessantly.

"To die," rasped, Truvio, " to sleep— No more—and by a sleep to say we end. The heartache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to—'tis a consummation devoutly to be wished!" Truvio thought his performance was brilliant, flashing a carnivorous grin at his vengeful audience, the big man whirling a sword before him.

The bright maiden, though, where had she gone? He had set her in a cage so she would see his performance, but she wasn't here. She was to die and rise up to become his queen of the dark and the damned! She was to be his Ophelia, his Juliette, his Cleopatra! The silver haired vixen was gone and it was the witcher's doing! NO! This, this …. bastard had spirited her away! Truvio began to snarl, twisting the words he spoke as his eyes narrowed into gleaming slits of hate.

"To die, to sleep." The honeyed accents of his voice took on the dark sibilance of a serpent, his movements became sinewy and calculated to draw blood from the man in front of him. With a swift strike, then another, Truvio scored deep and ragged lines through his opponent's armor, reveling in the pain and rage evident in his scream. The bard lifted one bloodied claw to his twisted face, let an impossibly long and obscene tongue flicker from between his lips, and licked the crimson drops from his fingers. Power! Blood magic called to him, shaking all his foundations as his voice dropped two octaves, and it seemed the words hung palpably in the air. "To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there's the rub, for in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause."

"Shut up you maggotty bastard!" Growled Letho, breathing heavily, his silver blade whirring like the rapid beat of a hummingbird's wing. "Shut up and fight!"

Truvio laughed, feeling power well up into his limbs like it never had before. Dodging away from the first silver thrust of that shrieking sword, the creature struck, raking his clawed hands along the man's reinforced leather gambeson and grunting in frustration when he didn't rip flesh this time.

"There's the respect that makes calamity of so long life!" Murmured Truvio, suddenly scuttling away from a series of concentrated blows from the hated silver blade, "For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, th' oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, the pangs of despised love,"

"Damn, you just don't stop. I'm going to cut your tongue out and feed it to you!" Gasping heavily, the big witcher slashed, then slashed, then slashed again, throwing his weight behind the blows, hoping to silence this stinking buffoon.

Truvio's cackle echoed around the ruins as he continued. Knowing that the play's the thing, after all. "the law's delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns that patient merit of th' unworthy takes, when he himself might his quietus make with a bare bodkin?"

Letho roared in defiance and anger. For every strike he thrust, he could not seem to reach the foul thing he fought. Not while it continued to vomit words. Letho backed off, fingering a grapeshot bomb, wondering if that would make Truvio shut up.

A voice pitched to resonate with angst throbbed from the bard, then, as he jumped at his antagonist, claws spread to catch the fleshly creature and rend him in a deadly embrace. "Who would fardels bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that the dread of something after death, the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns, puzzles the will and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of?"

"I fucking said SHUT UP!" Roared the witcher, flinging his bomb at Truvio as the wight charged, launching himself out of the blast radius as the ceramic casing of the grenade left his hand. The explosion cast up showers of broken rock and withered moss, the concussion thumping in the air. The bard reeled, standing as if in shock while the dust settled.

Rolling to his feet, the giant Viper prowled forward, swinging his silver blade to twinkle against the starlight, hypnotic, beautiful in it's deadly precision. Letho pirouetted, then thrust, catching Truvio just under the edge of a rib and running him through. The monsterslayer, for a moment, looked into eyes that cleared of madness, realization seeping into them and the dead man breathed out his final, gasping lines.

"Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, and thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought." Hands that had clutched at Letho's armor went slack as the body shuddered, stilling for the very last time.

Letho pulled his silver blade out of the body of the dead man, wiping gore from its length before seating it behind his right shoulder. Whatever Truvio had transformed into when he died the first time, the curse had been lifted with his second death and he was just a stinking, human corpse now. Staggering away, the big man pulled a dose of Swallow out of a pouch and downed it in one shot, bracing for its hit on his system. Then, lighting a torch, he descended back into the crypt. There should be a scroll in one of the sarcophagi a certain king would pay very well for. There were other treasures, to be sure, coins, jars of priceless frankincense and myrrh, the usual grave items. He found Treli's gear, marveling that her armor wasn't torn apart. The mad bard had undressed her carefully, it would seem. Barking out an ironic snort, Letho shoved the black leather trappings into her backpack and slung the works over his left shoulder. He had never found a lass so beautiful even the dead wanted to bed her and the thought sparked his dark humor.

Collecting the bard's discarded gear as well as anything from the rest of the milieu that caught his fancy, the big witcher returned to the hut by the time a new sun peeked above the horizon. The girl presented an enjoyable eye-full going through one of his saddle bags. His shirt hung loose on her, slipping off one shapely shoulder, letting the hem dip almost to her knees. Letho let the door close with a little force and reveled in her startled jump. She turned to him, with an apple stuck in her mouth and the remains of some travel bread in one hand. The edge of the big man's mouth tipped up in a sneer.

Nonchalantly, she leaned a hip against the table and chewed a bite of apple as she regarded him. Trelisha looked at the big man just as openly as he observed her, refusing to be intimidated into lowering her gaze. She knew she was in no shape to take him, or even run from him if it came to that. He had saved her life, so she figured he wasn't going to take it, but there were other ways a man could complicate her life. Her best bet was to brazen this out and see where the wind shifted. Munching the sweet fruit, she looked him over critically.

"That will probably need stitches." She suggested, staring at the gash across his belly.

"You offering?" He drawled, crossing one foot over the other as he leaned against the door.

Wordlessly, she held her hand up, flat, about the level of her chin. It shook like a leaf. Cocking an eyebrow at him, she took another slow bite of the apple, licking the juice off her bottom lip. Letho's gaze followed the motion with interest. One side of her delicate lips tipped up in a secret smile as she demurely dropped her eyes and took another, slow bite of the fruit, then brought her gaze back to his. Men were quite easy to direct, if you knew how to do it, and this witcher was no different. That was good to know, considering the rumors one heard along the road.

"I don't suppose you found my gear?" Trelisha asked, finishing the rest of the apple, leaving very little core once she was done. "Right about now, I'm dying for a hit off a healing potion and my own clothes. Your shirt is nice and all, but it'll fall off if I do more than breath in it."

Heat pooled in Letho's eyes as he looked at her. She was a consummate manipulator, he thought, her machinations obvious to him. He decided to play along with her game and see where she led him.

"You know, you owe me your life. I'm a witcher and don't work for free. What are you going to do to pay me back?" His grin was lascivious as he ogled her from foot to head. He pushed off the door and prowled toward her.

Without missing a beat, she flashed a bright smile. "Well, I'm sure we could come to an agreement ... if you found my gear." She raised an eyebrow at him, struggling not to sink to the floor as her legs shook under her. The rogue sensed she would lose this game if he knew how weak she was. Digging deep into her will, she stood, facing off with him as he stepped up to her, leaving no room between them. "Tell me, witcher. What is the going rate on a life?" She walked two fingers up his impressive chest and laid her palm flat on his breastbone, noting his medallion. Not even by the flicker of an eye did she betray her thoughts when she saw it.

"What do you have to offer?" His voice was a rolling purr and she found she rather enjoyed it.

"That depends on if you brought all my stuff back." She was using him to steady her own unsteady body. She calculated how much strength it would take to throw him to the ground if it came to that. While she could position herself correctly, and might even unbalance him for the throw, she was sure she would end up on top of him and that was an undignified position she wasn't willing to end up in.

"There's other things. I could suggest a way you could pay me back." Letho's breath fanned over her face, warm and spicy.

His face was close to her own and she took advantage of his blatant interest to skim one hand down his chest while the other played at the back of his thick neck. She swirled a finger u and down his throat and allowed her lips to part ever so slightly as she panted in a breath.

Chuckling, knowing he had won, he leaned in to capture her lips in a kiss then stopped sort. He felt the tip of his own dagger pressed to the underside of his jaw. He hadn't even felt her remove it from the sheath where he had it secured to his hip. Who was the victor here, really? Her face didn't even twitch and he started to laugh, backing off then. The girl had won. This round.

"Yeah, I found your stuff. It's outside, next to the door." His look was ironic, and considering, as she flipped the dagger in her hand and presented it to him, hilt first.

"Just so you know, I make it policy never to sleep with someone I'll be working with. And I have a feeling we'll be associates for some time." She tapped his medallion with her finger as he took the knife from her. She walked passed him and managed not to fall or trip before reaching the door. Holding herself up by the jamb, she turned back to him. "Though, if we weren't going to be partners, you might be fun."

With that parting shot, Treli left the hut and sank down beside her pack. Sweat was pouring down her back and she was shaking hard. Some of it was reaction to the battle of wills she had just won, but a larger part was her physical weakness. A filigreed silver vial leapt to her seeking fingers, causing the rogue to grimace in anticipation. Tipping the contents down her throat quickly, Treli choked down the vile, sickly sweet healing potion and clung to the pack as it kicked in. Spiraling warmth flowed through her and she felt the bruises and scrapes receding even as her vitality was restored. She still needed food and rest, but she would live. Making sure her armor and weapons were tucked into her pack, the tiny she-elf set off for the chuckling brook. Gods but she needed a bath in the worst way.

* * *

 **My bow to the Bard who wrote Act 3, Scene 3 of Hamlet and who so graciously has allowed me to borrow his famous soliloquy. I actually created this undead bard - yes,that's a nod to Everquest - seventeen years ago, when I drew up a DnD 2nd edition campaign. He was actually created as a ghast. Very tough fight for level 4 characters with the extra ghoulish muscle I added. I am so delighted to share him with you. Please let me know what you think by leaving a review :)**


	6. The Silver Rogue part 3

The stream was cold and clear, with a nice, deep pool fairly close to the hut. The rogue sat on a rock in the sunshine, just reveling in the chatter of birds and insects. She was alive and that was a greater miracle to her than anything she had witnessed in her long life. Treli dangled one bare foot in the water, lounging on the flat stone in simple short leggings and a close fitting shirt, pulling tangles out of her long, thick mass of silver hair. She hadn't checked her armor or weapons thoroughly yet, but everything seemed to be there. Her assortment of daggers and throwing knives would need some love today, a sharpening followed by a thorough oiling would knock the rust and cobwebs away from her mind and hone the blades in equal measures.

Quickly winding her hair into a single, thick plait that fell down the length of her back to swing just below her buttocks, the rogue stood and stretched with feline grace. Her gear stowed along with the witcher's shirt, she walked back to the hut, sniffing the air as she entered the ramshackle shelter.

"Mmmm is that breakfast?" She murmured, tipping an amused eyebrow at Letho as he knelt at the hearth, stirring a pot of something. A little boy, perhaps five, was practicing standing on one foot while the other was thrust behind him and his arms spread out in front to distribute his weight.

The big witcher observed her, hooding his eyes as he continued to tend the food. The bruises so prominent the night before on her pale skin were now no more than smudged brown and green shadows that were quickly fading. He admired her spirit, wondering what it had physically cost her to play her gambit this morning and walk away from him with her pride intact. He could easily have taken the dagger from her and bent her to his will, but what would have been the point?

"Truvio give you too much grief?" She asked in an offhand manner as she rummaged in her pack, pulling out a small flask of oil, some cloths and a whet stone. She put his folded shirt on top of the table and handed him a pouch of milled grain. "Not much left of my food stuff after … I really don't know how long I was down there, honestly. But those oats seem to be in good shape. My contribution to the group." Her grin was infectious, but Letho merely grunted at her, looking over the contents of the sack.

Carefully pulling a beautiful dagger from her belongings, the woman inspected its surface, then poured a drop of oil onto the blade and began rubbing with a cloth along its razor edge. As she became engrossed in her ministrations, she asked offhandedly, "You find Mortidel's Scroll?"

"What's that?" Letho evaded.

She chuckled, "The only reason anyone would have of coming all the way to these wilds and entering that crypt."

He grunted, "Don't need a reason to explore, sometimes find useful things in places like that."

"Mmhmm." She hummed as she picked up the whetstone and began to hone her blade with expert strokes. "You're a witcher, not a professional grave robber. And that particular tomb isn't terribly rich."

Letho just shook his head and dipped out a portion of the stew for the little boy, who had scuttled forward to take the metal cup in eager hands. Two more bowls were filled for her and himself and she thanked him, laying aside her things to savor the food. The big witcher chuckled quietly to himself. He never would have called his own cooking anything approaching tasty, but the girl was enjoying every bite as if it had been prepared by a master chef. He figured she needed feeding up after her enforced fast. Treli stood up when she was finished, holding her hand out for his and boy's dishes.

"You cooked, I'll clean up." She shrugged, heading out the door to the well. It didn't take long to rinse the crockery and leave them to dry in the sun. When she returned to the cabin, Letho was just coming out, Tavi in tow, each with a wooden sword strapped to their back.

"I know you got the scroll Letho. May I look at it please?" She gave him her most soulful look out of big, silvery gray eyes.

Letho scowled, refusing to fall prey to her pretty face and be manipulated. "You assume I found it. And if I did, what do you need to see it for?"

She smiled brightly. "I want to see if the legends are true about what it says. Could be useful information to have down the line if so, and people do pay for information."

The big man grumbled then reached into his satchel and pulled out a metallic blue tube about the length of his large hand, glittering with golden knobs at each end. As she grasped one end of the scroll tube, Letho pulled her toward him with the other till he was face to face with her.

"I want it back. Keep that in mind." His low, rumbled words counterpointed his scowling features.

"Don't worry, big guy. I'm not going to whisk it away." Her smile was charming, crinkling the corners of her eyes as she turned away and entered the hut.

Hours later, the witcher entered the one room dwelling to find the rogue hunched over the opened scroll, scrivener's tools spread before her and a pile of vellum sheets stacked at her elbow. So intense was her concentration she didn't look up, her hand steadily copying the words from the original. He watched for a time, arms crossed as he lounged at the door jam, as she painstakingly replicated the original. He noticed she even had the right kind of paper. Finished, she sat up and sanded the sheet carefully.

"So you're a counterfeiter as well as a thief." The witcher's voice was deceptively soft and low.

Treli winked at him. "Shhh, don't tell anyone. They'll all want a piece of the action and I'll never get any peace." She held the copy up next to the original, eying her work critically. Her tone was disinterested as she asked, "Who hired you?"

"Does it matter?" Letho shrugged, his eyes hooded.

"Not particularly. Just curious if you were approached by the buyer directly or if an agent made the offer to you." Groaning as she stretched, Trelisha pulled out another scroll tube, the twin of the original, from her pack and shipped her copy inside. The first scroll was restored to it's container before she passed it to the witcher.

"Why the copy?" He asked.

The corner of her mouth tilted in a grin. "In case There's more than one buyer. It's not the scroll itself that's so important, it's the information it contains."

He nodded. "How do you tell them apart?"

"Well, an expert would be able to tell, but since it's a straight copy with no changes, what's the point? There is a small difference in the cases, in any event." She held up her scroll case. "This is the copy. There's a small nub here, on the edge of the case." She ran her finger over the spot and let him feel it as well before she tucked it away. "And you have the original. No nub." She rose, reaching her hands above her in a lithe, bone popping move.

"What's so important about the scroll?" Letho asked as she pulled out her armor and considered her answer, pursing her lips at a damaged clasp.

"It details the law of succession for the Callamet Collective, how to determine if an heir is suitable or not. Each ruler has his own scroll made up and is buried with it. Supposedly, each of them is the same, only adding the name of the deceased to the list of dead kings, as well as their progeny, both legitimate and illegitimate." A repair kit was produced as the woman prepared to mend her armor. She continued to speak. "If there was a particularly bad ruler, they and their progeny might be stricken from the account of succeeding generations. Down the line, if there were questions of succession, royal scholars would determine which of the kings was most likely to have a scroll that included the outcast so the lineage could be properly accounted in case later lineages had dried up."

The big man grunted. "How long dead was the king I took this from?"

"Mortidel?" She tilted her head in thought. "Some three hundred years, I believe. It's of great interest not only to the Callamet succession, but to historians in general. The counterfeit will fetch a pretty sum on the black market. Eventually, it will find it's way to a display case in a museum or a private collection."

Turning her back on the witcher, the rogue began to don her armor, skin tight leather breeches and a corseted jacket hugged her slender figure. Straps and scabbards provided resting places for a multitude of edged weapons and small vials of dark liquid around her person as she inspected each blade before seating it in it's place. She was dressed in unrelenting black with only the silver of the matched tsais that crisscrossed her back, poking up above each shoulder, to add a flash of brightness to her shadows. Letho had known his share of comely wenches since he had been on the Path. Some of them were even skilled with swords or other combat. Somehow, Treli transcended them in her easy grace once fully armed and armored.

"Have you thought about my reward for saving your life?" his rumbling words eliciting a raised eyebrow from the elf.

"You never told me what a life is worth, master witcher." She sallied, crossing her arms over her chest and staring openly at him.

He prowled to her, stopping when there was only a hand span between them. "What do you think your life is worth?" He countered.

One corner of her mouth tilted in amusement as his eyes glittered molten gold down at her. "You really cash in on the intimidation, don't you?" She stood her ground, toe to toe with the big man for the second time that day and refusing to budge. "My life is priceless to me. I'm asking what you charge for saving it. A hundred marks? A thousand? The law of surprise?" Trelisha shrugged, daring him name his price.

Rippling through her, his baritone drawl raised sparks in her belly as he caressed the stubborn line of her jaw with one finger. "We'll let it be a future fulfillment. You'll owe me, Treli." His hand drifted to the back of her neck. "In the meantime, tell me about the tattoo. Where'd you get it?"

The woman shrugged as she put space between them. "I lost a bet and the scorpion was the most interesting thing the tattoo artist had on offer. It was years ago. Don't really think much about it now." She rubbed her fingers over the image.

The jingle of bridles interrupted them as Tavi burst into the room. "Riders!" The little boy gasped, hiding behind Letho. The witcher strode out of the hut just in time to see a contingent of armed knights trotting up on barded destriers. The Viper stood, arms held out to his side as he counted the company. Fourteen well armed men escorting what looked like nobility to this sheltered farmstead. The noble was kitted out in ornate red and gold armor with the phoenix rising emblazoned on his chest plate. Of average height, his face bore pox scars littered around thin, sallow cheeks. A mop of unruly chestnut curls topped his head over glinting brown eyes.

"Greetings, fellow." Hailed the noble. He raised his hand and called a halt as he dismounted. Letho just nodded, waiting as the man strode up to him, looking around surreptitiously. "I'm Count Aubrey Letalis. I'm looking for a woman."

"Yeah, aren't we all." Purred Letho in his drollest tone, subtly changing is stance so his weight was carried on his back leg, one hand rubbing the palm of the other close to his chest. To the casual observer, he was relaxed and non threatening.

Letalis scowled, his cheeks burning at the comment. "Her name is Trelisha Winterbourne. She's traveling with a minstrel who goes by the name of Truvio of Rodan, and they're wanted in the Collective for high crimes against the throne." Letalis pulled out a scroll and handed it to the witcher. Truvio and Trelisha were rendered in accurate pen strokes above a list of serious charges. Five thousand dakari marks dead or alive was the bounty on their heads.

Letho shrugged as he tucked the wanted poster into his satchel. "What did they do?"

"Murdered the king, stole the crown jewels and incited sedition with intent to overthrow the government." Intoned Letalis. "There's a bonus on the girl. She's worth an extra two thousand marks if she's delivered without a scratch."

The witcher's face was impassive as he promised to keep his eyes open for the criminals and stepped back to let the company pass. Letho watched till the knights had ridden out of sight, traveling toward the tomb. He turned back to the hut only to collide with the elf as she was coming out the door, her pack slung over her shoulder. He grabbed her by the arm and shoved her inside.

"Care to explain... Trelisha?" He ground out, shoving the wanted poster under her nose.

"Huh. Seven thousand to bring me in alive and unharmed. I'm flattered." She said, yanking out of Letho's grip. She eyed him suspiciously as she backed into the room further. "What are you going to do?"

"I dunno. Give me a good reason NOT to turn you in." He said, leaning against the door and blocking her escape. Khotavi was huddled near the hearth, watching the two adults face off.

"King Rewan himself hired me and Truvio to retrieve that scroll. He was alive and well when we left the palace several weeks ago." She murmured, stirring up dust as she began to pace.

The big man scratched his head just behind his ear. "It's a lot of money for a simple bounty."

"We didn't have any dealings with other nobility. Just servants, a few courtesans and the king." She sat at the table, pressing her fingers into her temples.

"So Rewan wanted the scroll because there was an issue with succession? Any other reason he would want it?" The witcher asked.

She shook her head and looked up at him. "He was old, not on his deathbed, though. And he had no issue, legitimate or otherwise. He wanted to establish an heir before it became problematic, wanted to avoid the inevitable power struggle between the factions." She thought for little then pinned him with a considering gaze. "Who hired you and how long ago? It wasn't that noble and it wasn't the king."

"A merchant in Tearth, name of Yeogan. About four days ago." Said the big man.

"Death of a king is usually well publicized in the affected realm. Do you know if he was alive when you left?" She watched as Lethe shook his head.

"You're right. Regicide is usually known far and wide before the bastard is cold on his byre." His sneer was self deprecating as he thought of his own activities in the western realms. "He wasn't dead yet when Tavi and I left Tearth." He turned, yanking the door open and glaring in the direction taken by Letalis' company. "Let's get out of here. Won't take them long to get to that tomb and find out the scroll is gone." She nodded in agreement as he started to gather up gear.

An hour later, a westerly wind was kicking up swirls of dust in the yard of the abandoned farmstead as Letalis and his men returned. Roaring his rage into the sky, the nobleman stalked away from the empty hut and commanded a hunter in his company to search the ground for tracks left by the witcher.


End file.
